The Cthulhu Mythos and other works of weird fiction master H.P. Lovecraft, have long been a common feature in Black and Death Metal releases. However, of all contemporary Lovecraftian acts, no other outfit seems to have put the true horror of the master fantasist to such evil music as Chilean outfit: Unaussprelichen Kulten – aptly named after one of the many fictional scriptures of the mythos. And the group’s third studio album: BAPHOMET PAN SHUB-NIGGURATH, will take you into the deepest, darkest realms of twisted storyteller’s genius.

Opening track ‘Prologue’ is suitably eerie with what sounds like a theremin being used to make a spine tingling sound before being plunged into the angriest, most vicious death metal I’d heard in a long time with ‘The Hooded Baphomet Bleated’. On more than one occasion I felt like I was listening to a Lovecraft themed album by Cannibal Corpse with vocalist Joseph Curwen sounding like Corpsegrinder. I was also heavily reminded of Possessed and early Morbid Angel with tracks ‘Yogge-Sothtothe’ and ‘Ceremony of Belial’ sounding grim but not too technical.

For a sub-genre of metal becoming all the more brutal and technical by the day, here we have an album that captures the old school brutality of Death Metal and does not outstay its grim welcome. Drums are not too technical, the blast beats are memorable and nicely paced, there are no ridiculous breakdowns, and the shredding of the guitars make the songs stick in your head nicely and get the dark and weird themes of the band across in the most brutal way possible. I would liken this band to old school sounding Death Metallers: Disfigurement. But most of all I must congratulate this band for keeping the terror of Lovecraft alive in Metal.

If you want something that simply says Death Metal to you, then BAPHOMET PAN SHUB-NIGGURATH is just for you. Enough dark themes and references to blackened mythology are made on this album and if Mr Lovecraft were here, he’d definitely be pleased with the morbid nod this band have made to the Cult of Cthulhu. Any Lovecraftian should listen to this band.